Top 10: Wrestling Personas

What makes a killer wrestling persona? Maybe it's the Mexican wrestling mask worn to hide his villainy. Maybe it’s the freak-show caliber of his deformity. Maybe it is the sheer hairiness of his oiled body. Or maybe he’s just a wicked actor. Whatever it is, a wrestler must embrace the spectacle of excess with his persona, performing the role not only in the ring, but also in interviews and in backstage shenanigans.

Whether it’s borderline homoerotic or backwoods bravado, top-notch wrestling personas are fully sketched characters that are performed with great care and exaggerated gestures. Good or evil, it is important for the wrestler’s persona to stir up controversy. If evil, it is vital to develop sinister associations in the public eye, fueling fear or hatred. If good, it is equally important for the wrestler’s purity and virtue to be displayed in every theatrical gesture. Because of this, it makes no difference if you have Arnold Schwarzenegger-sized muscles or puny little girly man twigs. Of course, as in all things, size matters to some extent, but a great persona can certainly level the playing field.

It should be noted that judging a wrestler's persona is different from judging their pedigree. Vince McMahon, Bret “Hitman” Hart and Andre the Giant, for example, are legendary wrestlers, but none of them developed a truly unique persona. Without further ado, here are our 10 noteworthy wrestling personas.

Number 10

George “The Animal” Steele

The Animal evoked both terror and sympathy. Not only was he beastly, but The Animal was a little slow upstairs, had a green tongue, ate the foam out of turnbuckles, and had a body as hairy as an orangutan. Outside the ring, George “The Animal” Steele spoke very little, but inside the ring, his mouth spoke loud and clear. He often pouted to gain sympathy right before he shifted gears to become a grunting, biting, turnbuckle-eating Animal.

In one of wrestling’s more compelling love triangles, The Animal developed a crush on Miss Elizabeth, Macho Man’s girlfriend. She couldn’t help sympathizing with George, which resulted in a jealous Macho Man being distracted in an Intercontinental Championship bout against Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat, who won the title thanks to George’s animalism.

Number 9

Mankind

Mankind was a tortured white-collar stiff who lived in a boiler room. Mankind portrayed the burden of office boredom and the psychosis that follows with self-inflicted brutality. Wearing a white shirt, a tie and a horrific mask, Mankind played a masochistic office drone who lost his mind in a cubicle. The result was a brooding character with some twisted ideas for inflicting pain on his adversaries and himself. His signature move, which cost him half an ear, was a suicidal attempt to hang himself between the second and third ropes. The only trouble with Mankind’s persona is that no real office drone could imagine such a bizarre repertoire of staples for a wrestling career.

Number 8

Goldust

Son of “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes, Goldust is more like a cross-dressing American Queen. Made up like an Oscar statue in gold and black, Goldust’s flamboyant entrance included a platinum blond wig and enough makeup to justify a five-step treatment program.

Meanwhile, back at the old ranch, Goldust was apparently a family man. Marlena, his wife and the director of their Shattered Dreams production company, was cast as a dutiful and loving southern belle — until the couple had to face the awkward domestic situation of a husband slowly stepping out of the closet.

In interviews and in the ring, Goldust’s theatrics relied on sexual innuendo and overt homoeroticism to distract his opponents. To describe the taboo sexualities Goldust’s persona represented, he was referred to as ”The Bizarre One,” which is true, if by bizarre, the WWF meant sexually repressed or homosexual.